1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to newspaper distribution. Particularly, the present invention relates to distributing newspaper inserts in a separate wrapped package along with the news sections of the newspaper.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Sunday newspapers for large metropolitan areas typically include a folded outer news section, several folded inner news sections, and a multiplicity of advertising, entertainment and promotional inserts. Such newspapers are ordinarily assembled by newspaper stuffing machines. Two such newspaper stuffing machines are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,168,828 and 4,477,067.
The newspaper stuffing machines include a plurality of fixed feeding stations disposed in a circular array. A plurality of pockets are movable below the feeding stations. At a first feeding station, the outer section is fed from a hopper into each of the pockets. The pockets successively carry the outer sections past subsequent feeding stations. Hoppers feed other news sections and inserts into the open outer section within each pocket. At a delivery station, the assembled newspaper is dropped from each pocket onto a conveyor. The newspapers are carried away by the conveyor for stacking and bundling.
Newspaper stuffing machines can have up to fourteen stations devoted to feeding inserts. However, large metropolitan Sunday newspapers can contain several dozen or more inserts. Therefore, several passes through the stuffing machines, with different inserts being fed at stations in successive passes, is required before assembling of the newspapers is complete. A common practice to aid in assembling the Sunday newspaper is to form a subassembly of all the inserts during slack periods between daily newspaper runs. The subassemblies are stored for later placement into the news sections when the Sunday newspaper is assembled.
Typically, the comics section is used as an outer jacket for this subassembly. The comics section is relatively flimsy and difficulties often arise in assembling, storing and handling such a subassembly. Consequently, a need exists for improvements in assembling large metropolitan newspapers, such as the Sunday edition. Particularly, a need exists for reducing the amount of collating and handling, and thereby the difficulties and costs, associated with assembling the newspapers.